


it's so hard for me to breathe

by svttv



Category: The Walking Dead (Telltale Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, F/F, god I am so sorry, mostly - Freeform, my heart goes out to all of u that lost lou/vi on ur first run
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-01
Updated: 2019-04-01
Packaged: 2019-12-30 12:00:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18314873
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/svttv/pseuds/svttv
Summary: What if Violet had stumbled into that barn with the rest of the herd?





	it's so hard for me to breathe

**Author's Note:**

> title from jordin spark's song: "no air" because all my fics have to have a song lyric as the title that's my thing now.
> 
> (episode 4 spoilers) In case it isn't obvious this takes place in the route where you don't trust AJ, resulting in Violet getting devoured.

Clementine could feel her arm getting heavy holding up AJ's gun, everything in her sight was beginning to feel blurry as she watched the boy she raised run the absolute fastest he could to shut the barn doors.

She felt sick as she watched the boy get grabbed by one of the walkers, she aimed but didn't shoot in fear of hitting the boy.

Luckily, AJ was able to pull out his knife and stab the walker's hand to escape it's grasp. She took this opportunity to take the chance and shoot the walker dead so he was able to close the last remaining door. 

She almost let herself exhale until both their eyes were drawn to the moans coming from the open corner of the barn, walkers dragging their feet into the barn they'd tried so hard to keep safe. She felt herself pull the trigger once again only to be stopped by the lack of bullets. 

From the corner of her eye she caught AJ pulling his knife from his pocket. The small boy made his way towards the first walker and kicked it in the knee to make the head easier to access, something he'd seen his guardian do many times before.

They were extremely lucky the walkers were so slow and AJ was so fast, Clementine felt as if she couldn't even count them at this point.

Though, that may have been the result of her own eyesight causing everything around her to multiply. 

Is this really what dying felt like?

AJ was still going at it, she thinks he might've been on his fifth one at this point. He was towards the opposite corner of the barn, seemingly having a hard time getting this one's knee to snap. 

Something in Clementine's mind told her to look away, though. She couldn't understand why her head drew her eyesight back to the opening to see something to her horror.

There limping towards her at an extremely slow pace was Violet. Or, what used to be her.

Clementine couldn't tell if she was being deceived or not, she knew it easily could've been her hallucinations.

But she felt her whole body go numb, her eyebrows furrowing and mouth opening adjacently.

The walker that had once been her girlfriend was still groaning, reaching it's hand out to grab her from such a far place. 

Never in her life has she ever felt herself so frozen in place. She knew she couldn't get up and run, do anything if she even wanted to. Her eyes glanced down to the vest she'd been wearing, seeing her infamous pin. 

Clementine felt her own mouth opening and closing, remembering the pin that had it's own place on her jacket.

The pin Violet had made her as a remembrance of their first confessions; of their first kiss. 

As if she could ever forget that.

Finally her own eyes started stinging, realizing that this was really Violet. Not a trick her mind was playing on her. It was very clear she'd been bitten in so many places. Her clothes were torn in some places and she was missing the entire bottom half of her left pant leg. 

Clementine knew her tears were falling now. She almost wanted to smile at the fact her pin was still attached despite all her other clothing being ripped apart. The identical pin to hers.

The pin she'd gotten before they danced.

Clementine's first time dancing with someone. Her first time caring so strongly about someone.

She felt as if her heart had broken in two; the girl didn't deserve this.

The beautiful girl that had given Clementine a sense of security she hadn't felt since Lee died.

Violet's arms were the only place she felt safe; she hoped Violet had felt safe in her's.

She was supposed to protect her, she'd failed. She failed the second most important person in her life. 

Her thoughts were jumbling up her own head. All she could think of was how many times she'd felt her hand in hers, back in the woods just mere hours before and feeling safety. 

Finding her alive after the boat explosion was a sense of relief she couldn't feign. It felt as if she'd been holding her breath from the moment she left her with Minerva's unresponsive body to shooting Marlon's bow to protect her.

Feeling her tight grasp in the woods because Violet had come looking for them. Because Violet was just as scared of Clementine dying as she was of her. It was hard for her to breathe; this isn't how it was supposed to happen.

_"We're safe, Clem. All we have to do now is get back to the school."_

And for the first time, she'd believed her. She truly believed they'd make it back safe because for once in her life, Violet made the possibility of true happiness a reality. She was going to go back, and they were going to build a recreation of her old tree house together, and make pancakes not on Saturdays, but whenever they wanted to. Because she knew it would make Clementine happy. 

Because Violet cared about her; just as deeply as Clementine cared about her. It was supposed to be them living in the school together, sleepless nights filled with laughter and comfort, because they'd always be there for each other. 

That's how it was supposed to be. They weren't _supposed_ to get bit. She wasn't supposed to be staring a very deceased, reanimated Violet in the face.

"Clementine!" She heard a voice ring in her ear, her eyes still blurry from tears and the walker that was someone she once cared about, someone she knew she'd soon enough fully fall in love with, was inching closer.

She saw AJ's small figure run in front of her place on the ground and kick Violet, no, the _walker_ in it's kneecaps. 

She noticed AJ's hesitance once she was on her one knee.

Clementine could only open her mouth, wanting to yell at him to kill her. If James' philosophy was right, she was suffering and she couldn't stand to see her take away this boy's life.

AJ came to his senses quickly though, stabbing the corpse in the head. Clementine's eyes shut, looking away from the scene. 

She heard the walker's body fall to the ground, and for the first time she felt the violent sobs coming from deep in her throat. She sensed AJ moving quickly, assuming he was running to close the last remaining door between the outside and safety.

If Clementine's vision had been blurry before, the tears made it as if she had gone blind. 

Her sobs were coming out loudly, gasping to get a little bit of breath. She doesn't know when AJ got so close to her again but she felt her hand being taken into his own; his other hand reaching up to her face and wiping the tears off of her.

"I'm sorry Clem, I should've taken the shot; I should've tried-" He was gasping out sobs now, shaking his head at the realization of the awful situation.

Clementine began shaking her head to stop him, she reached her own hand and touched him on the cheek. "No, AJ. Tennessee would've died. There was no right answer and don't you dare ever blame yourself, okay?" 

She noticed his own eyes welling with tears, overwhelmed with how much of his world has come crashing down in just a few hours. "I love you, AJ."

Her heart was heavy, heavier than she thinks it ever could've been. She knew she was bit, AJ knew. 

All she can hope now is that Tennessee was on the right track and that she'd see them all again, somewhere better than any smelly old school. 

**Author's Note:**

> I don't usually like writing stories this short but I still hope this suffices :-)  
> also i wrote this in like twenty minutes so probably not the best lmao. 
> 
> comments are ALWAYS appreciated


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